Ramblings about knitting, life, exploits, and other things.

Parenthood

October 02, 2013

When he did that, he took with him a canvas box of sorts. This box was his equivalent of a very sturdy laundry basket. It needed to be sturdy, because he would fill the box, and then ship it home, where his clothes were washed, hung to dry, likely pressed, and then folded and shipped back to him.

More recently, Kitty left home for college.

When she did that, she took with her a mesh box of sorts from Bed Bath & Beyond. They call it a 2-in-1 pop up hamper. It looks like this:

You will note that this is NOT a sturdy object. While my grandfather's laundry box wasn't in my thoughts when we bought
this one, I did not intend this to be able to serve as his did. Its sheer mesh sides demonstrate that it would be unlikley to withstand shipping of any kind. In fact, it's pretty susceptible to tearing if one abuses it. Clearly, it was not intended to serve as a way to have laundry shipped back and forth.

And yet.

Last weekend, my lovely daughter came home with her hamper full of dirty clothes. When she left, it was not quite as full of clean clothes. This is because she evidently got distracted during the laundry process. When I went to wash MY laundry, I found a load of jeans and towels lurking in my washer. Guess whose they are?

If only I had a sturdy canvas box to ship them to her. Alas, we don't even have a nice box lying about. At least none large enough to accomodate a large load of laundry. I will save her this time. After all, life at college is hard enough without the weather turning cold when you have only shorts and skirts to live in. Not to mention the towel shortage.

August 19, 2013

Kitty is safely ensconced
in her dorm, whining a bit that the wifi in her room is sketchy. She's
being wonderfully adult about it though -- and has already located
areas nearby where the wifi is good. I'm hoping she'll mention it to
the staff though. After all, she's going to be doing a lot of computing
in her room, and on days where she really wants to just huddle down and
work without dealing with -- weather -- or -- people -- she'll need
that wifi.

Golf Pro and I invaded her space ... we went into her room armed with a vacuum cleaner. First, we pulled everything on the floor out into the hall, gathered the last remaining glass, spoon, and 1/2 finished can of Sprite, and accumulated a prodigious pile of videos to take back to their rightful places downstairs. Then we vacuumed up the dog fur, crumbs, and other stuff, and rescued the plant that would have died sitting alone unwatered until she came home. I've laundered her sheets and remade her bed. I've laundered the clothes that were lying about, and put them away. ...

There are still a few things lying about the house -- a pair of shoes under the couch, a book on the counter. For now, that makes it feel just a little bit like she's only out with friends, or at a sleepover. Within a day or two, we'll have found them all, and put them away in her room. And then it will be real. Kitty has moved out.

I suspect that for a little while, I'll be delighted at not finding her dishes sitting on the kitchen counter waiting for the house elf that we don't have to clean up after her. But already, I'm noticing the empty space at the dining room table.

I'm looking forward to hearing about the things she's learning, the people she's meeting, the experiences she's having. But I miss her anyway.

Doing my job meant preparing her to leave. I'm glad she's able to be away. I'm glad she's doing well so far. I'm confident she'll do well and better than well as time goes on. But I'm sad, just a little, just the same. It is the way of being a mom.

August 18, 2013

First: Kitty had .... experienced an issue with her new iPhone. One that required immediate use of the insurance policy. Though she tried to make a claim on Saturday, when the replacement hadn't arrived by Wednesday, we called to see what had happened. Evidently, she'd entered something wrong, and hadn't quite made the claim. So we had to start over. Sigh. This meant that she would be arriving to the dorm without a phone.

During the phone call, we told the company very clearly that they now needed to ship the phone to her at the dorm ... not to the homestead. They said they could get this done. So, we calmed ourselves with the knowledge that though she'd arrive with no phone, one would arrive the next day.

The hour before departure was a bit tense. I was all fussy, fretting that we'd leave something behind, and trying to stuff that last object into the overburdened car. The Thule Carrier on top was full, with only room for wee things that we weren't putting up top. The back hatch was full to bursting, with no visibility out the rear window. And Kitty was trying to do last minute FaceBook goodbyes. But, we calmed down, took a final inventory of the things that absolutely had to go: glasses, ID, keys, contacts, medicine. Check. Everything else could be dealt with.

We loaded up, and took off out of the drive way a mere 5 minutes later than my stated goal. (Doing this allowed us 4 1/2 hours to make a 3 hour drive, but I wanted plenty of time for lunch, and hitches, and to leave room to pick up groceries on the way into town).

Bookworm was confidently driving, quietly happy in the knowledge that by the time she drove us home at the end of the day, she'd have completed the required 50 hours behind the wheel, and would thus be "ready" to take her driver's license test.

Then, about half an hour later, Kitty realized that despite all our efforts, she had not in fact gotten everything into the car. We had lists to purchase, and then lists to pack, and then lists to cross check. Even so, when she got out of the shower Thursday morning, she forgot to gather her shampoo, conditioner and body wash. Oops. Of all the things to forget, however, this was probably the easiest to fix.

We gloated in our ability to actually leave on time, and stopped en route for KFC. We calmly waited for the slow food service, knowing we had tons of time. We sat and ate at a relaxed pace, practically dawdling at the table.

Things went smoothly until about an hour away from the dorm. Suddenly, traffic slowed to a crawl. Then we saw the sign: the highway ahead was closed because of a crash. Hoping that the crash meant lots of property damage but no loss of life, we crept along to the next exit where the State Troopers were directing us to leave the highway.

The next hour moved very slowly. Ten miles an hour got us excited - it almost felt fast. There were plenty of long stops. We began to fret. We stewed. At one long pause for no apparent reason, Bookworm and I traded places. So. At 2:00, we were on some side road, sitting behind a semi, with the GPS on the phone saying we were half a mile from the on-ramp back onto the highway. We couldn't tell if we'd be allowed back on, or if the highway traffic was moving. Assuming we were in fact allowed to get on the highway, the machine told us we were 30 minutes away from the dorm. At 2:30, we were supposed to check in.

Finally, we reached the highway. I dithered a lot about bailing on the highway, and taking back roads ... but Golf Pro saw that traffic was actually moving on the highway, so I took the chance. For the first ten minutes or so, it was really slow going. The high way was down to one lane (construction). Once we got past the construction, I had to fight to resist going 90 mph -- I did not want to be late! If we missed our window, we'd not be able to load in until after 5 pm. I kept apologizing to her, feeling as though if only I'd taken the back roads, those last ten minutes of highway at a crawl wouldn't have slowed us down... (yeah, right).

Then Kitty fessed up -- it wasn't a 2:30 absolute! It was a 2:30 -3:00 window! Phew! We arrived at the check in place at 2:45. She got her number for moving in.... we waited a bit, then got to go pull into the circle drive in front of her dorm.

Once we parked, the car was all but swarmed by friendly students who were working the move in. They unloaded everything and carried it into the dorm room. By the time the fridge came in on the cart, Kitty and I (with help from one of the students) had "lofted" the bed (raising it up to 3 feet high), and thus we were able to slide the fridge under it so that it didnt' take up valuable floor space. We made the bed, and said hello to the roomie, then took off to go grocery shopping.

By 5:00, she was settling in. She had groceries (which included fruit, and cheese, and much more healthy stuff than junk! I'm so proud), and all her stuff, and was eager to get things organized. We hugged goodbye, and a much emptier car headed back north for home.

When we got home, we discovered a package. It was the phone. Evidently, the woman at the other end hit "approve" BEFORE she changed the address. So. Yeah.

I got that sorted out, finally, and Kitty's phone will be in her hands by Monday.

On Friday, another package arrived -- it's the case to protect the phone. So... I made up a wee package, in which I stashed a few minor forgotten items, some stamps and a treat. She should have that by Tuesday.

And with that -- my babygirl is suddenly independently living at college! I can't decide whether to hang a baby picture or her most recent photo on the wall...

May 30, 2013

I don't remember learning this stuff, so it is possible that my mother did for me what I've been doing with/for Kitty this week. But somehow, I knew how to do some of this before I had my first checking account. Maybe it's because I didn't get one until after I'd been working for a couple of years -- I always just put my money in the savings account, and got what little cash I needed.

Anyway, today we went to the bank to make a deposit. How often do you actually think about what that entails? Just in case there are any young readers out there, I'll go over it (we can be stunned at the number of steps involved).

Upon arrival at the bank, we went up to the little desk, and

1. Get a Checking (or, if appropriate, Savings) Deposit slip. Note that there is more than one kind of slip, and be sure to get the right one.

Here's a random sample of a deposit slip:

2. Fill out the slip:

a. In line number one: Enter today's date. For many of us, this requires looking at something to find out what today's date IS. Luckily, most banks have a little calendar thing on that desk, that tells you.

b. In line number 2: Enter your name in the Account Holder's Name blank - print, so it's legible.

c. Decide if you want cash back. if you DO want cash back, you'll need to sign the form on line number 7 (the line under the one on which you printed your name). If you're just putting money in, you don't actually need to sign it.

d. At the bottom of the slip, if it's one from the bank's desk, you'll need to enter your account number. If you don't know it, and you have your check book handy, you can look at your check. There are three numbers along the bottom; the first one is the Bank Routing Number (that's the one that tells other banks which bank has the money in it); the second number is your checking account number; the third number (likely to be three or four digits long) is the check number for the check you're looking at.

e. Fill in the information about what you're depositing in the spaces in section #3 in that picture above. If you're not actually depositing cash, but have a bunch of checks to deposit, you can actually put a check in that line. Otherwise, enter each check separately, putting the "cents" in the last two columns, and the dollars in the left columns.

f. Total up the amount of all the checks, in line #5, and then if you're taking out cash, put that amount in line # 6. Subtract line 6 from line 5, and enter the total amount you're depositing in the line UNDER # 6, oddly un numbered in the above picture.

3. Sign the back of any check you're depositing. -- This signature is you saying that the money represented by the check has come to you....

4. Take the check and the deposit slip up to the teller, and give them to him/her. S/he will enter the information, record the deposit in your account and give you a receipt - for it

5. If you didn't do this earlier - open your check register, and RECORD the deposit.

6. After entering the amount of the deposit -- update the balance in your register.

That all seems so intuitive to me, and yet watching Kitty face it for the first time, I realize that it isn't. That's a lot of steps for a simple action.

May 26, 2013

My first baby is 18 now. She's taken her last ever class in public school. In just a couple of days, she'll be walking across that stage wearing a "gown" that matches the ones around her, and a square hat.

She's chosen her college. We've signed a housing contract for her, and she's in correspondence with someone who is likely to be her roommate in the dorm.

That makes it kind of real.

It's coming home to me, and to her, that she's not so much a kid anymore.

Friday, we took one more step.

Armed with a check that represented a birthday money gift from her grandparents, we went to the bank. That's not an uncommon thing, actually. We do that every year, every time anyone gives her a birthday check (or holiday check or....). However, this time, we did not go to the teller. This time we did not deposit the check into her savings account, we did not withdraw a small portion of that check to give her some cash to play with, and no part of that money got pulled to deposit in her College Savings Account.

This time ... before we even went to the bank, we had a few discussions about which bank we would go to for this next step. And this time, the decisions were all up to her. Here's what she had to consider

1. This is her checking account. She will have control over it. She'll be able to put money in and take money out any time she wants to do anything she wants.

2. The ease of putting money in and taking money out depends in part on a local branch for your bank.

3. There appear to be NO banks with branches in both our home town and the town in which her college sits. We have confirmed that there are NO banks with branches both in our home town and the on the campus where she'll be living, working and spending her money.

4. If she gets an account that is solely her account, regardless of the bank she chooses, she will almost certainly have to pay fees to the local bank at CollegeTown every time she withdraws cash using an ATM.

5. If she gets a joint account with one of her parents, we can get one of the accounts for older folks like us with multiple accounts and loans etc. at the bank. With one of those accounts, she will not have to pay fees to use any ATM in the United States -- even and especially the ones in the Student Center at her college campus.

6. If she gets a joint account with one of her parents, her parents will have access to her account - which means we can look at the balance, we can see where she spends money, in theory we could take money, and we can deposit money easily.

Her first reaction, at which no one is surprised, was that she didn't want her parents to have access to her account. But when the time came, she chose to get a joint account with me at our bank - those ATM fees started sounding scary.

And so, we went to the bank, bypassed the tellers, and sat down with one of the Personal Banking Staff, made decisions, and opened a checking account.

We discussed how to use a check register, and why, even if you do have online banking, you really want to USE the check regiser.

Why is that, you may ask?

Simple.

If you USE the check register, and record every withdrawal (check or ATM or debit card use), and tot up the BALANCE with EVERY transaction, you'll always know how much money you have in the account.

If you don't use the check register, but rely instead on the online banking screen, you will not get accurate information. This is not to say that the online screen is lying to you -- it's just that the online system doesn't have all the information all the time.

Sure, and ATM withdrawal will show up darn close to right away. But checks don't (especially if you mail them). Unless the people to whom you gave the checks bank at one or two of the GIANT banks, they still have to take the checks to their physical banks, which process them and send them off to the issuing bank (i.e. your account) (sometimes via Federal Reserve Banks), which have to process them -- it can be days or weeks before they show up in your account. Relying on your online balance ignores outstanding physical checks.

And... even though using your debit card feels a lot like using the ATM (swiping and all that), sometimes the debit card transaction doesn't get sent on to YOUR bank for a day or two. Really small stores may not run their transactions for a couple of days. So, the $35.00 you spent on that adorable bracelet you bought at the farmers market may not show up in your account for three or four days. Relying on the online banking numbers might get you to spend more than you actually have...

And ... if you USE your check register reliably, you can easily balance your checkbook when your bank statement arrives. This is also a good thing.

Why? if you keep your register religiously, what's the point of balancing things??

Well... once in a blue moon the bank makes a mistake. When that happens, being armed with your check register can help you spot it -- so that they can fix it.

But more likely, you'll transpose a number somewhere. You'll write a check for $25.38 and enter it into your register as $23.58. That means your register thinks you have $1.80 more than it does. Imagine this if we move the decimal point left. OUCH. You'll catch that if you balance your check book. AND... since they also tend to give you at least IMAGES of your checks, you can verify who is right.

May 19, 2013

Eighteen years ago Friday, at the tail end of a visit from my mother, I spent an afternoon walking through the zoo with my mother and my husband (Golf Pro). We were walking through the zoo because my cousin had found it to be an effective solution to what I'll euphemistically call "delayed onset labor".

It worked!

Eighteen years ago yesterday, after a long labor, mostly spent trying to persuade my already willful daughter to turn her head, Kitty lay on my chest, looking up at me with beautiful blue eyes while her mother, grandmother, father, and godmother looked down at the miracle. It was the last time she voluntarily got up before 7:30 a.m.

Over the years, she's spent a lot of time with Grandmother

Doing things near water....

Making music

And growing up

or not...

She was a vibrant, creative child; and she's a vibrant creative woman.

There's too much to say to put in one post -- and though she deserves it, I'm just not going to write a post about her sense of humor, or the wonderful fiction she writes, or the paintings (several of which grace our walls), or the drawings and pen & ink images, or the music, or Shakespeare. I won't share the struggles and passions -- because they're HER life, and one thing is true: she's a bit private.

Happy Birthday Kitty. Welcome to the world of responsibility and freedom.

May 16, 2013

Last weekend, my lovely stepdaughter LJ donned a traditional robe and a traditional if somewhat odd hat, gathered together with a bunch of like-attired folk, and participated in an age-old ritual of passage.

She sat in a marginally comfortable hall while leaders and elders droned on a bit about things that are important, but which we'd all be better off hearing one bit a day instead of all at once.

She listened as those of her peers who seem to have done everything already were praised for their achievements before giving speeches of their own.

And she celebrated with a large congregations worth of fellows as they all transitioned to the next stages in their lives.

I missed it. I was working (and they're stingy as all get out with the number of tickets). But GolfPro was there to witness, and beam with pride, as his daughter graduated from college. In FOUR years. (yes, I know that's standard -- but I also know that when you start not knowing what you really want to do, it can sometimes take longer).

I did, however get to enjoy a wonderful celebratory dinner which I think stands as a testament to the way blended families ought to behave. There, at one table, swapping stories, and smiling and generally feeling like one collective proud happy family, sat LJ's half-sisters (Kitty and Bookworm (half sisters on one side) flanked A. (half sister on the other side) her mother, her maternal aunt, her step-mother and her father. We were untied in our love for LJ, and in our appreciation and acceptance of each other.

And when the food was eaten and the bill paid, we left after shuffling who rode with who so that Dad, Maternal Aunt, and Half-Sisters could go to the store to pick out pie and ice cream, while Mother, Step-Mother, the Star (LJ) and the Friend could come to our house to brew coffee, open up the table and gather chairs for an impromptu dessert.

I love it when families blend together to support their kids and each other instead of sniping about old hurts. I'm so pleased to be part of such sanity twice (my parents and step-parents get along beautifully all four together, and have done it so well forever -- so much so that I was stunned the first time I learned that divorcing families are often nasty to each other).

All too soon, she'll be back in her home-town, finding an awesome job, and starting her adult life. We've enjoyed having her visit for dinner during her college years, and will miss that. But we're so proud of her achievement.

May 10, 2013

Last week, after dashing about like a bit of a crazy person, dashing out the door at work to fetch Bookworm from practice to scramble to the salon for her facial... I escorted a fresh-faced gal to her sister's last concert of her High School Career.

I hadn't thought about that until they had finished their first piece. As they launched into their second piece, which was an Elegy, I realized that this was the last time I would sit in that auditorium to hear my daughter play. It was poignant and sad times two. And yes, I cried.

Alas, I didn't get decent pictures. My phone can only do so much in the dark from the back half of the auditorium.

Before it was over, they got the Seniors to stand. There she is, in the front row... blurry. Just imagine you're looking through my teary eyes.

May 08, 2013

One of the many quintessential High School Events is Prom. Around here, the issue of whether anyone in our house would be going prom has long been an open question. For a while, it looked like no one would be going. And then, as things are wont to do, things changeed.

Bookworm was sure she didn't want to go, but her friends wanted her to go. The nudged, and pushed, and nagged, until she caved.

And we went into high gear.

Golf Pro took her to an event to get prom dresses without spending a small fortune.

We conspired to give her a useful birthday present ---

A BLUE FACE!

no.... wait....

A Mummy!

no? (okay, a facial) and....

French Manicure from the Dark Side? nahhhh

Very cool manicure that matches her dress.....

a charming date and some laughter.

We made it through the various challenges, missed timing, and hair disasters (luckily not Bookworm's, but the friend who was supposed to come to our house for pre-prom photos and then drive to prom had one that meant she was too late to come by at all). They went to the Prom, came back to change clothes, and at midnight, I dropped them off at the Y for post prom swimming (they declined to climb the rocks).

Best of all, they arrived home safely after having a good time.

(Made me wish I had a dancy party to go to where _I_ could get all dressed up and wear a wrist corsage).

Everything he said is true. And everything he said still applies to bigger children.

My girls are in high school. One graduates in less than two months. The other, who skipped a grade, and thus is already younger than her class-mates, has gotten her ducks in a row to graduate a semester early. So... in 2014, I will have no high school students.

But they are not "grown," and they continue to pose the various types of challenges that children pose. They push boundaries -- the way kids do. The way kids need to do in order to grow, and learn, and be able to function in the world around them. Of course, they also need to honor boundaries sometimes. And like all kids, they are better at that some times than they are at others.

There are those who say that it is the nature of a teenager to behave horribly towards their parents. They say that teenagers are "crazy". I'd even agree, to some extent, since I realize that they are in the throes of rewiring their brains (I was going to embed part of the video from here, but something's not working - I've left it here in case it gets fixed on their end).

As if the rewiring thing isnt' enough, they're also trying to navigate the impossible journeys of hormones and peer-relationships. But I have known teenagers who were civil human beings all the way through the "bad years" and remain lovely people to this day.

And thus, I too face those moments when, if someone told me to "treasure every minute" because it "goes too fast" I'd have to squelch the urge to whallop them upside the head with the nearest heavy object.

Every single day, I say to myself "I am not a terrible parent, even if their current behavior towards me is atrocious beyond reckoning." I have to remind myself that they' are evolutionarily programmed to do a separation dance so that when they're "grown" and otherwise ready, we're both willing to have them leave the nest. I need to be ready to see them gone, and they need to be ready to step away from the safety of home. Some days, I"m really ready. Some days none of us are.

At least once a day, I remind myself that "I am not an evil worthless brainless non-caring person, no matter what they say." Again, that separation thing kicks in, and they accuse me of not caring (mostly because I'm not doing what they want, or when they want or something. I know I care. I'm pretty sure they know I care. But they forget, and are rude about it. It's not a fun place to be.

Several times I week, I remind myself that "I DID teach them manners and values and...' And even though they don't always practice those things in front of me, I do learn from other parents that my girls are polite, respectful, courteous. It's good to know that they can pull that off outside in the real world. And I have confidence, that once this separation dance is over, they'll be able to do it consistently at home too.

Every single day, I remind myself that perfection isn't a realistic goal. I remind myself that at every step of the way I did the best I could with what was available to me at the time, and that sometimes, cope is just unavailable. If you take nothing else from this post, take that -- perfection is not a reasonable or realistic goal at any time when you're dealing with human beings.

At least once a week, I remind myself that it does not constitute parenting failure if your kid doesn't have the latest gadget that her friend has, or that she has to wear last month's clothes or that you let her spend her own money on clothes when she never tells you what she needs.

"You are not a terrible parent if the sound of their voices sometimes makes you want to drink and never stop.

"You’re not a terrible parent.

"You’re an actual parent with limits.
You cannot do it all. We all need to admit that one of the casualties
specific to our information saturated culture is that we have
sky-scraper standards for parenting, where we feel like we’re failing
horribly if we"

haven't gotten them to do chores reliably, or keep their rooms clean, or remember to clean up after themselves, or even remember to say please and thank you when they ask to to drive them somewhere and pay for things they want to do, and we let things slide.

Those other parents whose children DO do the dishes? They're dealing with something else. Their kids are no more perfect than yours or mine.

Every so often, some other parent tells me how polite my children are, or otherwise lets me know that out there, in the public eye, they're okay. I relish those moments.

And every so often, when I see someone out there in the real world doing some good parenting, I pause and tell them so. I know how much it feels like you'll never get it right sometimes.

We joke about setting the bar too high, and tell our brilliant, lovely daughters that really, if setting the bar at graduating high-school without getting arrested or pregnant is too high, they should let us know.

But it's also true ... that even though parenting teenagers, like parenting small children, is a perpetual challenge for which the media has set the bar beyond the reach of any actual human parents ... I regularly get little moments when I see the adults they're going to become, and I'm proud and tickled.

And every day. EVERY day, I love my girls.

Every day, if I but pause, and relax, and let go of the current frustration, I know that I'm living with two amazing, talented, beautiful young women

December 02, 2012

I knit all the time, but things for them seem to take longer than they'd like. Part of this, of course, is because they never ask for something for which they're happy with a specific pattern. If they want, for example, wrist warmers - they don't want wrist warmers from any patterns I can find, they want something ... different.

So, I wind up designing something custom... And designing takes time.

Recently, Kitty has been swiping my gloves. Like me, she has hands that aren't quite what women's glove makers have in mind. I offered to make a pair for her, and she pointed out this delay issue.

I took that as a challenge (though she didn't mean it that way). I bought the yarn within days, and began knitting. Again, without a pattern in mind because, well, standard patterns don't fit us.

She has challenged me in another way. She wants plain gloves.

Plain.

No cables. No lace. No colorwork. No texture beyond basic ribbing for the cuffs.

Plain.

That challenge is harder.

I'm trying to persuade myself that the fiddli-ness of the fingers will be enough.

October 01, 2012

Last week, parents all over town went in to visit their school-age children's teachers for Parent- Teacher Conferences. This year, Golf-Pro and I were among the many, as we went in to discuss what we could do to help the girls solve whatever problems there were that were causing each of them to have some grades plummet in bad ways.

Yes, of course, some of the problem is that there needs to be more studying.

And yes, there is a bit of spacing out (even occasional sleeping) in class. (And yes, we're reinstating the BED TIME chez Shadow).

But the real problem seems to be with their essays. Since they're both in AP classes (that's Advance Placement, which means they are sort of doing college classes in high school), these essay issues are affecting not only their English classes (duh), but their Bio and History classes. But what's up with the essays?

It's not that they don't have good things to say: The essays clearly show that the ShadowKids are full of keen insight (sometimes awesome insight). The things that Kitty sees in the poems she reads, and in the novels she reads are just amazing. It's CLEARLY not that she's reading shallowly.

It's not that they have trouble putting their insights into words: They've got a lovely facility with language. They have great grammar, and thus build lovley sentences.

Evidently, there's a wee bit of a structural problem. Somehow, they've gotten where they are without really learning basics of paragraphs: No one seems to have really conveyed the part where a single paragraph should have a single idea. Sure, a paragraph has more than one sentence (we're not making lists, we're writing paragraphs), but there should be one main idea in that paragraph, with supporting statements for THAT idea.

Without understanding the one paragraph:one idea approach, people tend to load paragraphs up with a bunch of ideas. Scattershot "paragraphs" are great for brain storming, but they don't work well for essays. When you have too many ideas in a paragraph, it's easy to discover you haven't actually supported some of those ideas. In fact, sometimes it means that the best idea gets no support. (In bio this means that important details get omitted.)

How do we let our children get into HIGH SCHOOL without teaching them basic essay structure?? Heck, PARAGRAPH structure?

What else are we letting them get to high school without learning?

(for those of you politically minded -- think of this as you go voting for your State candidates -- where is YOUR state prioritizing education?)

July 28, 2012

Ages ago, she used a Sony laptop. Over time, the poor thing took a few hits. Somewhere in our house is a space bar ...

Let's take a closer look ....

Yep... no space bar. And no 8 key either.

When her Grandpa gave her a refurbished laptop for her birthday last year, she handed this one down ... so the 8 key might have been someone else's fault.

But... that computer also suffered ..

Now, she may have had some reason to be frustrated with the old computer's slowness, and crankiness, but still,

This past week, the crankiness and slowness revealed its cause: hard drive failure.

Complete.

Brick.

(and, this was the third such bricklike stunt since the refurbed computer came into her life.)

The economy, and the retail worlds eagerness to provide zero interest credit to get us to spend money made it possbile for me to fix both the brickiness and the keyboard failures. Better still, we have some familial assistance in the form of early Holiday Presents..

July 16, 2012

As often happens in this wonderfully interconnected world, a blog post has prompted some wonderful savvy responses. This time, it happened here in ShadowLand.

I posted about my surprise and frustration that my 15 year old was able to check out a movie from the library that was either originally rated NC-17 and then defined as unrated, or was the alternative version, rated R. Until I actually put it in the DVD player and watch it, I can't tell which version we have in the house, because it didn't come with the full box.

Janna said:

"As a librarian, here's what I think their policy probably is: it's up to you, as the parent, to be aware of what your children are reading and watching. This is the policy behind NOT banning books. It's not up to them to decide what is suitable for your child. And I know you're going to say "But movies have ratings!" But it's a slippery slope and if the library isn't already on that slope by policing movies, they won't find themselves being shoved into policing books. What if an R or NC-17-rated movie is based on a book? Should access to the book be controlled, too? Where do you draw that line? By not having a line at all, that parent who doesn't want their child reading The Great Gatsby isn't going to be restricting your child, too. (http://www.ala.org/advocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/challengedclassics)."

That gets me thinking along several lines:

First off, I agree with her, generally.

If we let the library decide who can check out what, we're inviting them to censor our reading. I don't want anyone else deciding what I can read, or even what my kids can read. I don't want them deciding what we can watch, either.

On the other hand, I figure if a library follows the same policy as the theaters do, using the ratings that are out there, they won't go wrong. If the ratings rules mean that a 16 year old can't get in to see a film, period, then the library is reasonable in saying she can't check the film out. Mom (or frankly anyone over 17) can always check it out and let her watch it, of course. (The fact that they now call it NC-17 (in part because it can be assigned for violence, drugs, or exceedingly aberrant behaviors in addition to sex or even pornographic scenes) and not X is irrelevant here). Ditto, if the ratings rules say you need a parent or guardian to take you in, the library can say she needs a parent or guardian to approve her rental of that movie. Heck, the library policy could state that teens have to have a parent or guardian sign a release to clear them to check out R rated movies.

It takes a village to raise a child. That's because parents cannot be by their children's side all the time. And just like parents can't always there when the kid tries to get into the movies, parents can't always be there when the tween or teen goes to the library. (Heck, around here, one of the middle schools is right across the street from the library; the kids go over to the library after school all the time). A parent can always come later and say "yes, it's okay, she can see that," and then check out a movie. But a parent can't always be there to say, "whoa, no.... not yet" before it's too late. The theaters deal with this by assuming it's not okay to let a person under 17 see an R rated unless the parents, guardians, or other presumably responsible adult escorts them.

As I said, I don't want someone else deciding what we can read. I'd rather my girls wound up reading pornographic literature before I thought it was a good idea than have someone else deprive them of the chance to read something because they'd put it on a banned books list. I mean seriously, have you looked at the banned books lists lately? China banned Alice in Wonderland! There was a time when Chaucer's Canterbury Tales were banned. Are You There God It's Me Margaret, which has it's place on the Top 100 Children's Books list, has been "challenged" in various places in the U.S.

On the other hand, There's something a bit different about movies. Not that I want anyone banning movies, or limiting them generally. But I do agree that there are some films that kids aren't old enough to see. There's something different about visuals. It's one thing to READ that a stoned out woman is paying for her cocaine by performing a rather, shall we say "non-standard" sex act -- even to read exactly what she did. (There is such a scene described in the synopsis fo the film that inspired my previous post - even reading the synopsis made me uncomfortable). If you're reading something, and you have no experience to back it up, you're not likely to be ABLE to really visualize it. It's even harder to give it not only sight but sound. If you're watching.... it's right there in your face, with sound. It's vivid and real in a way that books rarely are. (Could potentially be traumatizing to some -- especially someone two, three, four years under the age indicated by the ratings.) It's really hard to unsee something.

I don't see that restricting access to a movie has to mean restricting access to a corresponding book. Screenwriters are prone to changing books slightly (or a lot -- I've seen movies "inspired by" books that shared little more with the original book than the title and some character names). What might have been a scene that wasn't played out in full in the book might become one that is very detailed in the film. An assault scene can be written many ways -- in a book it might be simply presented, or referred to in memories - the character remembers a man's hand on her mouth. In a movie, you see it, vividly, clearly; you see the hairs on the backs of his hands, the dirt under his fingernails, the way his fingers distort the flesh of her cheeks.... Almost no one describes such things in the detail that you can get from 5 seconds of film. (Of course, the screen writer can also choose to omit a brutal scene too).

And so, I don't automatically equate a film with the book upon which it's based. Reading the book might be no big deal, or it might be less appropriate than the film. But if the impact is going to be a strong one, I'd rather my kids have the book in hand than watch the NC-17 film.

It IS a slippery slope. And I would not want any library to take it upon themselves to make the decisions about who gets to check out what movies. But there is a system in place to determine how old a person ought to be before they can see certain movies. And the library has a system in place that ties a child patron's age to his or her library card number. It makes sense to let them work together. That system, working in tandem, would help parents know which things they need to weigh in on. (In this case, had I been alerted (either by my daughter whining that the library wouldn't let her check something out, or by the library sending an automatic email that a child was attempting to check out an R rated (or NC-17 rated) film), I would not have discovered the issue at 11:30 p.m. on a night before I had to be up early.

Now, ultimately, I don't intend to let the librarians decide whether my child can watch any given movie, or read any given book. I do not even intend to let the ratings people make the ultimate decision on that. I still think it's the parent's job to get in there and figure things out one child at a time. I still read books I see my kids reading (even if I don't catch them before my daughters read them, I do read them, and if I think it's appropriate, I discuss them). I still make my own judgements about films too.

I don't want the library to do my job. I'm saying that where a system is in place to protect kids from things that they're not ready for, it should be used. Kind of like we expect the shopkeepers to decline to sell them cigarettes and/or alcohol until they're old enough. Just as I can choose to let my children smoke or drink in my own home (which I don't )... I can choose to let my children see movies with violent or degrading sex scenes. Either way, the parent should be doing the choosing. When the stores say no, the parent can choose. When the theater says no, the parent can choose. When the library doesn't say no, the parent may not be able to choose before it's too late.

I haven't decided whether to suck it up and watch a film that I've been told is beautifully made, but very depressing, or to join my child in watching it, but either way, I'm not banning her from watching it. (I have told her she can't watch it with her friends without her friends' parents telling me it's okay for them to see -- I'm not making that decision for any other parents or their kids). I've learned enough about the film from people I know who have seen it (doing my research a different way), that I think it won't scar her for life. But I'm glad I had an opportunity to find out enough about this movie to make an informed decision before she watched it. Had she started watching it one half hour later, I'd not have had that chance.

July 14, 2012

As many of you know, I'm a huge fan of the library. Here in Shadowland, we have an entire bookcase devoted to library books -- the ones we've borrowed and are reading. Yes, we check out so many books at a time that we need that book case. And yes, its contents get rotated constantly.

We also use the library to check out movies, cd's, etc. And lately, our library has gotten itself hooked up electronically with a massive inter-library loan system that means we can "order" books (or movies) from just about any library anywhere.

Until this evening, I thought this unfettered access was awesome!

This evening, I chanced upon one of the girls starting a movie she'd ordered through inter-library loan. It was a movie I'd never heard of. Requiem for a Dream. It sounded creepy. It looked kind of creepy. When I asked what it was about, she said she didn't know, she hadn't seen it yet.

Doesn't sound exactly uplifting, and might even provide a cautionary tale. I've always kind of liked Ellen Burstyn..... But further research (IMBD) revealed that it's rated NC-17. Even so, the quick summary at the top of IMDB's page didn't sound that scary. They said, "Drugs. They consume mind, body and soul. Once you're hooked, you're hooked. Four lives. Four addicts. Four failures. Despite their aspirations of greatness, they succumb to their addictions. Watching the addicts spiral out of control, we bear witness to the dirtiest, ugliest portions of the underworld addicts reside in. It is shocking and eye-opening but demands to be seen by both addicts and non-addicts alike."

Again, a cautionary tale, but that bit about being shocking and eye-opening... bearing witness to the dirtiest ugliest portions of the underworld hints at why it was originally rated NC-17. When I discovered why it got that rating, I interrupted my daughter to talk about why she ordered it, and whether she knew what she was getting into. She didn't really answer me, saying only that a friend had said it was good. I'm not sure she DID know, but either way she shut it off.

It got that rating because of scenes later in the film in which one of the addicted characters essentially sells herself for sex, engaging in orgies, including some on camera sex acts that would make me more than a little bit uncomfortable to watch. You can read for yourself here, if you're so inclined.

Now, according to Wikipedia, " In the United States, the film was originally rated NC-17 by the MPAA, but Aronofsky appealed the rating, claiming that cutting any portion of the film would dilute its message. The appeal was denied and Artisan decided to release the film unrated. An R-rated version was released on video, with the sex scene edited, but the rest of the movie identical to the unrated version." Note... edited, not deleted.

And I can't tell from the box containing the disc which version my daughter brought home. I suppose I could watch it myself, and then tell her what's there and let her decide if she's really ready to see that, but frankly, I don't want to watch it. It sounds horribly depressing.

This is where I start wanting libraries to exert a little more control over who gets to borrow what. Our library already exerts what I consider to be appropriate control over who gets to look at what on the internet while at the library.

Upstairs, where the general stuff is, in a space between regular fiction (for grown ups), and non-fiction, there's a bank of computers. I think you have to be at least a teen, but maybe even an adult, to use these computers. It can tell because among the information they have keyed into your library account is your age. On these computers, you can pretty much access anything on the internet.

But...

Our library has a wonderful space on the first floor just for kids. There are computers there that you have to have a child's library card to use. Those computers don't access any sites that would be questionable for someone under the age of 12. Parents of four year olds can feel safe letting their kids use the computers (assuming they know how). They have age appropriate games on them too.

They also have a room just for teens. This room also has computers. In this room, you have to have a teen's library card to access the computers. These computers will go to a broader range of internet sites, but do not go to "adult" sites. I'm guessing that you can't even get to many sites that deal with recreational pharmaceuticals.

And yet, my 15 year old daughter was able to use her teen library card to check out an NC-17 film??? Or even a film that was originally NC-17, but that had one scene "edited" to sneak it into an R rating.

Really? Had she gone to the theater, she would not have been allowed to go in to see that film. After all, the R rating means that no one under 17 can see the film without a parent or guardian (note, that means I'd have to take her), and the NC-17 rating means that no one under 17 can go in at all, even with a parent or guardian. If she can't see it alone at the theater, why can she check it out of the library?

I'm not saying that I haven't let her see R rated films. But there's an R rating and an R rating. Some I have no problem with; others ... well, I prefer to discuss the issues, and/or scenes, with my daughters either before, during or after the film. It's what I consider to be part of responsible parenting.

I've written to the library, hoping that this was a bizarre event, and that they do, in fact, have some system in place that prevents teens from checking out films they'd otherwise either not be allowed to go in to see, or would at least need their parents along to see. (Heck, I think they should also have a system in place that prevents 8 year olds from checking out PG-13 movies withou their parent's permission). After all, we know they know how hold they are -- it's in their account. Should I have been worried that the girls could bring home Caligula when they were 9?

Have I become a fuddy duddy? Have I leapt off the bridge into ultra-conservatism? Or am I being a reasonable person here?

June 17, 2012

Picture, if you will, a home in which the oldest child is about to embark on her first ever trip away from home all by herself. She's off to camp - to spend a full week focusing on art.

As you might expect, the impending trip means that someone will be looking at the list of required items (I just love that camps tell you what you need; it makes life much simpler). Suitcases will be hauled out of the closet, and then discarded for larger ones when the traveler realizes just how much space all that stuff takes.

And there will be shopping.

I don't care who you are, the likelihood that you have, in your house, right now, all of the things you need to pack for a week at camp is slim unless you just finished shopping. If you've just come back from camp, you're likely to be out of something -- batteries perhaps, but also likely you'll need to replace whatever that thing was that got lost at camp. However, in our house, we've found that packing for camp reveals that there are many things we should have had anyway that we don't.

There will also be revelations about just what is involved in preparing for a long trip. In years past, Mama Shadow did all the preparations, made up the list of things that were needed, bought all the stuff we needed during the week before, and oversaw all the packing and loading. In years past, the ShadowFamily was blissfully oblivious. They simply had to choose their books. This year, Kitty got to learn a bit.

And I got to do last minute shopping things down to the wire. I kid you not. I purchased the last item to go into her suitcase less than an hour before her flight departed.

On Thursday, I told Kitty to take the packing list from camp, and start packing... and urged her to make a list of EVERYTHING she might need, so that as she packed and found that she didn't have some item, she could add it to the list of things we'd need to buy. On Friday, we embarked on the shopping trip. The list was ominously long.

Oddly, the first thing on the list was socks and underwear, thus revealing to me that I do laundry more than I'd thought. If you have enough of those things to make it through each week in daily life, but not enough to make it for a week away when you won't be doing laundry .... well, you do the math.

Thanks to the TSA, of course, we got to buy "trial sizes" of all sorts of things: toothpaste, bodywash, lotion, deodorant..... I know they're only $0.99 each, but that adds up pretty fast when your cart is full of those things. Luckily, we escaped that effort for shampoo and conditioner, since we wisely have travel sized bottles in house.

Because it's art camp, we had to buy an Art Box into which to put the paints, pencils, erasers, brushes, pens, etc. that are the artist's tools. This box, of course, has to be just the right size. Not too big, else it won't fit in the suitcase; not too small, else it won't hold all the supplies. And it has to have the right sort of organizing divisions. I was lucky ... I managed to find the right source for said box in our first store (which was, in fact, the store I practically had to pay her to go into; she was certain it would be a waste of time). I was luckier still in that the necessary portfolio with which to transport her art was in the same store!

We shopped for several hours, and managed to avoid arguments the whole afternoon, then returned home. I told her to pack the suitcase, and when it had everything in it, we'd fetch the boyfriend for dinner. Why so fussy? Well, her flight left at 9:05 a.m. Saturday. This meant that we had to be at the airport by 8:15 a.m. to make sure that her bag was checked etc. (and to let me pay the check baggage fee (both ways)), and make sure that she made it through security in time etc. (I hate to think how early we'd have needed to be there if we lived in a city!). Kitty is emphatically not a morning person, so I knew that the suitcase had to be 100% done before I went to bed, or we'd never make it.

After dinner, I sat down with Kitty and the list, and for each item on it, I asked whether it was, in fact, in the suitcase. This meant that the boyfriend wound up lurking about watching movies on the TV with Bookworm while Kitty discovered how many things she'd forgotten to actually put in the suitcase. Like sheets. Oh, and a blanket.

Then, at 10:30 p.m., we drove the boyfriend home, and on our way back at 10:45, we had a conversation in which we discovered that she needed a padlock. Seriously. Even though she knew that they'd have lockers, but that she needed to provide the lock, it didn't occur to her to put the lock on the list of things she'd need. (Well, the camp didn't put the lock on their list either, so I suppose I can cut her some slack).

Thank heavens for all night drug stores -- we were able to purchase the padlock.

In the morning, I learned that though she has a flashlight, she'd been using it to read in bed for the past several weeks. Can you guess what this means about its AAA batteries? Yeah. So, we left early for the airport and were grateful that WalMart is open at 8:00 a.m.

I'm not sure Kitty was fully awake when we sent her through the TSA line. That meant that she was moving pretty slowly. Luckily for her, I suppose, the line moved more slowly than I'd ever seen one move. (Again, oh so grateful not to be doing this in a big city). Here she goes -- into the evil xray thing about which I will not blog today.

I was sure that my role as travel facilitator was over once she got through that thing. But alas, no.

When she boarded the wee plane, they determined that since she had the coveted single window seat, she did not have enough room to stow her carry-on bag (note, it's the smallest rolling bag I've seen that wasn't a child's toy-sized bag). They relieved her of it (I'm thinking it was the flight attendant), but did not give her a receipt of any kind, and she didn't know that she'd need to fetch it from the flight attendant -- and so looked for it in the gate way when she got off the plane. It wasn't there. This was troubling on many levels, most significantly to her -- it had her itinerary in it.

Two phone calls later (thank you cell phones), she had recovered the bag, and found her gate -- in O'hare! My facilitating duties were then, finally, over.

She texted on arrival in Traverse City, and has since texted that all is well. I likely won't hear from her again until she's chosen the coveted T-shirt.

I am pleased (and not surprised) that she successfully made it through changing planes in O'Hare, and finding the folks from camp. But, as moms are wont to be, I'm a little sad to see my firstborn stretching her wings. In barely more than a year, she'll be starting college. And the next thing I know, she'll be living on her own, out in the wild world. snif.

June 12, 2012

Tonight, I'm going to ramble on in a whiny way about some of the frustrations of parenting teenagers. Perhaps its because I'm trying to balance the gloaty stuff (as in my High School Senior is taking a COLLEGE class now). Perhaps it's just because it's been a tough couple of days.

Sometimes, parenting seems like an endless circle of "you can do no right," looping interminably with a leminscate of "it's never enough."

Usually, those times come along when your kids are making another step towards adulthood (and independence). Unless, of course, they come along when your kids are having another wee moment of regression -- falling back to regroup before progressing again.

For example, as your kids get older, you (reasonably in your eyes) begin to expect them to take on part of the responsibility for getting what they want. If Child wants to take a park district class, and Child is, say 10, you're likely to call up the park district, confirm the times and places, and ask them whether the child will need any special clothing or shoes or supplies. If Child is 15, you may ask Child to find out whether there are any special clothing, shoe or supply needs -- and to find out what those requirements are.

When Child was 10, this stuff just happened. When Child is 15, Child is just as likely to say "sure Mom," and make the phone call coming back with some but not all of the information as Child is to get all the information about clothing, shoe and supply needs along with a list of the places that carry what he or she needs. And either of those is as likely as Child looking at you like you've grown a second (or third) head and asking something like "How am I supposed to do THAT?"

So, agreeing to pay for a class isn't enough (there's the equipment too, right). Agreeing to pay for the class and buying the supplies won't be enough. Trust me on this -- the basic supplies will be "lame" and if you dont' agree to pony up for the special extras that cost twice as much, you'll be lame too. If a leotard is in order, she'll ask for dance shorts (and extra $30.00).

And don't forget, you've agreed to drive Child to the class and pick Child up again after killing the hour and a quarter between the start and finish of the class. And that isn't really enough either. Trust me on this. Child will either want to be early, or be offended at having to hang around for ten whole minutes before class. Ditto picking Child up after class-- if you're not right on time, Child is offended because Child hates WAITING. Unless, of course, you are right on time, then Child will be irritated that you're depriving her (or him) of time to hang with her friends (yes, those people she complained about last week because she didn't know anyone, and everyone was lame).

Take note: It is wholly unacceptable for the Parent to keep the Child waiting ... even for two or three minutes ... when the Child is ready to go. Trust me ... Child will tell you this. However, it is completely unreasonable to ask Child to keep an eye out for your car, or to be outside where you can see him/her when you arrive, so that Child will be ready to get in within a minute or two of your arrival. How CAN you ask such a thing?? Can't you see that Child is busy?? Child is SOCIALIZING!!! You can wait .... and you should text when you get there -- Child will check her phone every so often to see .... but will not pay attention to the fact that she has chosen the dead spot in the building, where there is no cell reception, to hang out waiting for you. Child will eventually come looking for you once the all-important friends leave. Bring a book next time.

More fun, of course, is communication about impending transportation issues.

It is not possible to say, "Mom, can you give me a ride to the library at around 1:00? I'd like to meet Friend, who will be waiting for me there." Instead, your teen will say "Can you take me to the library this afternoon? And can we pick up Friend there to bring Friend home with us".

If you've said yes, and then have the temerity to want to take a shower at 12:40 because you'd been cleaning, or gardening, or what have you all morning, they'll be miffed that you're not leaving instead of stepping into the shower. But they will not tell you that they're miffed because they'd set a time to meet Friend. They won't tell you that until you're LATE!!! as you get into the car at 1:30. And they'll fume and snarl all the way to the library.

I do not remember it working this way when I was a teenager. Of course, I was a teenager

Tonight, I'm going to ramble on in a whiny way about some of the frustrations of parenting teenagers. Perhaps its because I'm trying to balance the gloaty stuff (as in my High School Senior is taking a COLLEGE class now). Perhaps it's just because it's been a tough couple of days.

Sometimes, parenting seems like an endless circle of "you can do no right," looping interminably with a leminscate of "it's never enough."

Usually, those times come along when your kids are making another step towards adulthood (and independence). Unless, of course, they come along when your kids are having another wee moment of regression -- falling back to regroup before progressing again.

For example, as your kids get older, you (reasonably in your eyes) begin to expect them to take on part of the responsibility for getting what they want. If Child wants to take a park district class, and Child is, say 10, you're likely to call up the park district, confirm the times and places, and ask them whether the child will need any special clothing or shoes or supplies. If Child is 15, you may ask Child to find out whether there are any special clothing, shoe or supply needs -- and to find out what those requirements are.

When Child was 10, this stuff just happened. When Child is 15, Child is just as likely to say "sure Mom," and make the phone call coming back with some but not all of the information as Child is to get all the information about clothing, shoe and supply needs along with a list of the places that carry what he or she needs. And either of those is as likely as Child looking at you like you've grown a second (or third) head and asking something like "How am I supposed to do THAT?"

So, agreeing to pay for a class isn't enough (there's the equipment too, right). Agreeing to pay for the class and buying the supplies won't be enough. Trust me on this -- the basic supplies will be "lame" and if you dont' agree to pony up for the special extras that cost twice as much, you'll be lame too. If a leotard is in order, she'll ask for dance shorts (and extra $30.00).

And don't forget, you've agreed to drive Child to the class and pick Child up again after killing the hour and a quarter between the start and finish of the class. And that isn't really enough either. Trust me on this. Child will either want to be early, or be offended at having to hang around for ten whole minutes before class. Ditto picking Child up after class-- if you're not right on time, Child is offended because Child hates WAITING. Unless, of course, you are right on time, then Child will be irritated that you're depriving her (or him) of time to hang with her friends (yes, those people she complained about last week because she didn't know anyone, and everyone was lame).

Take note: It is wholly unacceptable for the Parent to keep the Child waiting ... even for two or three minutes ... when the Child is ready to go. Trust me ... Child will tell you this. However, it is completely unreasonable to ask Child to keep an eye out for your car, or to be outside where you can see him/her when you arrive, so that Child will be ready to get in within a minute or two of your arrival. How CAN you ask such a thing?? Can't you see that Child is busy?? Child is SOCIALIZING!!! You can wait .... and you should text when you get there -- Child will check her phone every so often to see .... but will not pay attention to the fact that she has chosen the dead spot in the building, where there is no cell reception, to hang out waiting for you. Child will eventually come looking for you once the all-important friends leave. Bring a book next time.

More fun, of course, is communication about impending transportation issues.

It is not possible to say, "Mom, can you give me a ride to the library at around 1:00? I'd like to meet Friend, who will be waiting for me there." Instead, your teen will say "Can you take me to the library this afternoon? And can we pick up Friend there to bring Friend home with us".

If you've said yes, and then have the temerity to want to take a shower at 12:40 because you'd been cleaning, or gardening, or what have you all morning, they'll be miffed that you're not leaving instead of stepping into the shower. But they will not tell you that they're miffed because they'd set a time to meet Friend. They won't tell you that until you're LATE!!! as you get into the car at 1:30. And they'll fume and snarl all the way to the library.

I do not remember it working this way when I was a teenager. Of course, I was a teenager, so my perceptions are likely to be pretty skewed. (Mom, if you're reading this -- feel free to reveal the truth in the comments. If my perceptions are valid, I'll be vindicated; if not, I'm tough enough to face the bitter truth (maybe)).

By the time I was 15, I was pretty much getting myself anywhere I needed to go, or even wanted to go. Of course, when I was 15, almost everywhere I wanted to go was a fairly easy bike ride away. Every now and then, I'd need to take a bus -- but the bus always went where I was headed. By the time I was 16, not only were the bike and the bus reliable alternatives, but half my friends had cars (and the rules about not driving with more than one person under the age of 18 in the car with you weren't implemented yet).

My children have been spoiled utterly -- partly because I have been home to do it, and partly because we live so far away from the school (5.1 miles walking, 5.4 - 6.8 miles by car) and the library (5.3 miles walking, 5.6 miles by car) and the mall (7.7 miles walking, 9 miles driving) and most of their friends. They've had access to a car and driver for most things. Sure, Kitty has mastered the fine art of taking the bus home from the library --

but she's not yet mastered the equally fine art of taking the bus FROM home.

Breaking them free of the dependency on their "car and driver"

(mom and the station wagon), is proving to be quite difficult. Despite that impending push for independence from the Driver (as they get ever closer to being licensed drivers), I am a little afraid of how it's going to look when they no longer need the Driver. I'm anticipating lots of skirmishes over whether I need the Car more than they "need" the car. I'm not anticipating much in the way of offers to pay for the insurance or gas or .... tires or headlights or oil....

June 05, 2012

I blinked, and time seems to have gone into fast-forward mode. (Well, for everything except the healing rate on Golf Pro's knee, which is going apace, but which is a slow process).

Yesterday, I took my finals for the Spring Semester. At least it feels that way. Then there was the Mid-Term that I've somehow already taken for the Early Summer, and in three days I'll be taking another final! Huh? Four week courses are mind blowing that way. (And yet, it doesn't seem like I've been cramming information into my brain...)

Last week, Kitty was taking her first clarinet lesson, and gearing up for middle school.

Yesterday, it seems, I had to face the reality that both of my daughters are in high school.

Last week, Bookworm was working on bridging the gap from riding a tricycle to riding a bicycle with training wheels...

Next week, Bookworm starts the classroom portion of Drivers' Ed.

Last week, Kitty was buidling small things with Lego's

This week, she will be taking her drivers test.

Last week, Gramma was reading stories to Kitty

..... Next week, she will start a dual credit course at the local Community College. That means that in seven days she'll begin earning COLLEGE credit!

May 07, 2012

Today, while taking a break from studying for the Pathology exam that I have in about three hours, I popped over to one of my favorite blogs and read this review of The Mary Frances Sewing Book.

First off, of course, Franklin's writing is a delight. I now crave that book. I may have the sequel, The Knitting and Crochet Book, but I'm pretty sure I've resisted this one ... so far.

Franklin's description is wonderful, but it reminds me that these books are more than just fairy tales (even if faries do appear). They're excellent instruction books. Franklin demonstrates what you can learn with a petticoat for his doll. It's perfect. It's beautiful. It reminds me that I have a sewing machine and yards upon yards of fabric languishing in various storage places in my house. There was a time that I sewed well enough to make my own prom dress -- and a three piece suit for myself.

It reminds me that I have a daughter who would love little more than to discover that she has a full wardrobe of garb to choose from the next time someone murmers the words "Renn Faire". I also have a daughter who will be out of school in less than a month.

I wonder. Could we learn to sew together this summer? (Not that I won't be busier than ever with classes, but I already know a lot of this stuff, so for me it would be a refresher course). Perhaps it's time to pick up that second book (which is actually the first).

Said daughter has a birthday coming up. ... This is the point where it gets really hard to resist deciding that what she wants is a sewing kit. I'm pretty sure what she wants is combat boots, and not a sewing kit.

I'll ponder this deliciousness a while longer, but first... Pathology awaits. I need to be able to identify which disease it is that comes with "a progressive degeneration of the brain, leading to memory loss, personality change, and eventually death"* and indicate whether massage is okay for someone who has it. We will not discuss that today, I feel like I have memory loss, and I fear a personality change is in the offing since I'm oddly attracted to the idea of applying lace edgings to tiny linen things. At least I know that this exam won't kill me.

April 21, 2012

I got awesome classical music -- and the next night -- I got to see Kitty perform in Beauty & the Beast (more music).

First up, Joshua Bell performing Beethoven with the Academy at St. Martin in the Fields. I love Beethoven. Especially the symphonies. And with this performance, I heard things in the 7th Symphony that I'd never really heard before.

Bell does something deliciously different, so it was familiar and new at the same time. I love it when musicians do that!

I'm still missing my "mindless" knitting -- so no progress was made on the AWOL Hopeful Socks. Luckily, The Beethoven was so good I hardly missed it.

And the next night, I saw again why our school's drama department is so well known. We had a packed house for the third formal performance of Beauty & the Beast. Alas, I have no pictures, but it was GREAT.

I still had no knitting, but I did spend part of the time waiting for the show to start (and intermission) winding a skein for a new project.

April 06, 2012

It was so special, that even the rehearsal lords at the school cooperated, which meant that by 4:00, the whole family was free from our various obligations.

It was so special, that the massage gods granted mercy on my, and let my body not go into exhaustive melt-down at the end of Clinicals (the fun day during which we go in at 11:30, prepare our spaces, and then do three massages back-to-back, with only 15 minutes between the time one massage ends and the next begins - more on that in another post). So I had actual energy to be THERE to celebrate.

The postal gods were not as kind, and thus, the birthday celebrant has only IOU's to show for the day.

Despite the fact that there are probably thousands of pictures of our celebrant on Facebook, she was a bit camera shy.

Who is that person? You mean you can't recognize her from the black fingernails and ginger hair?

I'll give you some hints.

She's bright and witty (though lately her wit has become a bit ascerbic). She's got an uncanny ability to remember exact lines from a dizzying number of movies and TV show episodes. Despite having a mother who is only marginally adept at applying make-up, she's came into the world with a talent for applying make-up that some professionals wish they had.

She may hide from the camera, but when she's behind it, she takes some pretty amazing pictures.

She is talented, and responsible, and fun.

She has an internal radar for bargains that means that her wardrobe is larger than mine, by a lot, though she buys it all herself, using only allowance money (and the earnings from occaisional baby-sitting). She's thrilled with birthday gifts of gift-cards from her favorite stores, and always manages to stretch them into at least twice as many clothes as anyone else would be able to buy.

I'm sure you'll be shocked to discover that she plays in the band. (Well, maybe not.) Since she plays trombone, it's usually hard to get a decent picture of her in concert. The last one I took was at least four years ago.

March 26, 2012

When I got up Sunday morning, my plan included studying for Monday's Pathology exam, possibly paying bills, reading, and giving one homework massage.

Instead, I took Bookworm to the store to get supplies to repair a hair disaster, and spent the next couple of hours carefully re-bleaching her hair, in preparation for re-coloring her hair.

Bookworm is very grateful that my camera when on strike today. Otherwise, you'd see photos of the hair disaster (in which her hair color ranged from the dark mahogany/burgundy brown she'd last died it, through various shades of fox, dark strawberry blond, butterscotch, platinum blonde, wheat, apricot, ....

While it could have been VERY COOL, the color ranges weren't in interesting natural looking streaks.... they were more.... spotted. Like someone took the fur colors of a red fox or red panda, and used the patterns of, say an ocelot. In short... NOT good.

There would also be pictures of the process, with her hair mostly pinned up, and some foil wrapped, to show you just how small the sections were that I worked with, so that I'd bleach the brown parts, and lighten the darker foxy colors, without over bleaching the honey and platinum.....

Of course, there are also no pictures of the almost finished results -- the bleaching is done, and her hair looks pretty good -- sort of strawberry blond. But we're going to even it out a little better with a round of blonde dye after it's had a chance to breathe from two days in a row of bleaching.

For the record -- I'm actually opposed to my high school aged daughter dyeing her hair. I'm even more opposed to her doing it in ways that require bleaching. But -- the whole thing started months and months ago when she slipped out to Walgreens and spent her own money on hair dye. She surprised me with the new color - fait accompli. And luckily, it actually looked quite good. I decided that this was a battle I was not going to win.

However, after this weekend's mishap, she and I had a chat about intense color changed (especially ones invovling bleach. Next time, she's going to buy the product from the beauty supply shop, not Walgreen's, and she's going to have ME help her for things more complex than simple coloring. Kitty meant well, but she's never had it done, much less watched it being done, and thus didn't quite know how to tackle the job.

By the time stage one of hair repair was done, it was time for me to give a massage. (Day spa time... get your hair colored (or trimmed), and a massage. I can even paint your tonails, though I'm no pro at the whole pedicure thing. (snicker).

I closed the day giving a massage to Golf Pro, who was long overdue.

I finally got to the pathology book at about 11:30 p.m. Color me grateful that the exam wasn't until 2:00 p.m.

I'm hoping that the camera and I get back on good terms so I can show you the new BookWorm. It looks great, even if I do keep having to do double takes. (It's a pretty drastic change).

February 26, 2012

I've been blessed in the past three days with seeing three wonderful performances. One of them, I'll be posting about in a day or so.

The other two were more important - to me any way. Why? Well, mostly because of one of the performers. My beloved Kitty, fun, feisty, challenging, irritating, beautiful, insolent, loving, joyous, angry gal that she is (what? she's a 16 year old girl, how else do you describe a 16 year old girl?), made her hight school theater debut this weekend.

She's not a Thespian yet, but I think she certainly proved herself. She took on the role of Amelia in Othello, and performed it brilliantly. Most folks won't realize that the few moments she had on stage in the First Act may have shown greater acting ability than the brilliant rendition of righteous indignation in the last act, but she played the subservient handmaiden to perfection when she appeared beside Desdemona.

She then played the saucy wench, toying lightly with her husband, in a manner that I hadn't known she knew how to do. (I'm not at all sure I like that she can pull that off so well, but it made me proud to see her do it on stage).

But my favorite part was in Act II. There, she had a fairly lengthy bit to say, in a scene where she not only had to wrap her 21st century tounge around 17th century English, but do so with feeling. And my goodness. This woman-child just OWNS that Shakespearean English! There was no sign of stumbling over the odd locution. No hint that this isn't just the way one talks! No funky pandering to the iambic pentameter that so many let make Shakespeare sound stilted. Not here. She was feisty and furious and wonderful!

And..

She died well.

How many actors die well? Really. You've seen them, the actors who over-die. Or who just flop so it looks like someone pulled the plug. This is not my gal. She get's stabbed -- in the lung, one suspects. She stumbles, as one would. But she doesn't flail about. And you hear in her speech that she's losing the ability to breathe. The coughing was just right. It's hard to die well, but she did. I saw it twice, and both nights, she did wonderfully.

I'm more than a little proud. Now if only I'd managed to get a decent picture!

(Oh, and while I wouldn't say that the production was the finest Othello I've seen, severa of the other cast members proved themselves able as well. The Othello in particular was amazing. He too, owned the language as well as the role. This is the second show I've seen with him; very different roles, very well played. I will be surprised if we don't see him on bigger stages in the future.)

September 16, 2011

I keep making these plans about what's going to come up on this blog next.

Lately they've included knitting, and traveling and such.

But today clearly had other things in mind. Today was so not normal, I kind of want to have a record. And... most of what wasn't normal is likely to pop up again before the year's over, so I may as well share.

Friday mornings are supposed to look like this:

I get up at 7:00, and make sure my daughters have already gotten up too. We load up the car by 7:30, I drive them to school, where they shamble off without having said much, and I drive to school myself to learn about anatomy.

Today, my day started at 5:30 a.m. when Golf Pro informed me that he was finally ready to take me up on my offer to drive him to Convenient Care. (Tuesday night, he fell somehow, and hurt his back so that he woke up in pain Wednesday. I'd been urging a doctor visit since Wednesday evening).

I persuaded him that if he'd been willing to wait two whole days, two and a half more hours to take the cost from a $175.00 ER visit to a $20.00 Convenient Care visit might be okay.

So, I got up shortly before 7:00, went to roust Kitty (who is usually up before that) only to find an immovable lump in her bed. She opened one eye and outlined some symptoms that sounded unpleasant, and I let her sleep. I rousted Bookworm, who wasn't terribly happy about it, then got dressed, and helped Golf Pro down the stairs.

I made coffee, drank coffee while writing up all I could about Golf Pro's last couple of days and the various symptoms I'd been keeping track of, and then loaded Golf Pro into the car. Bookworm loaded herself, and I drove 7.5 miles to the school, then back 7 miles to the Convenient Care. Checked Golf Pro in, and abandoned him to the medical folk while I drove 8 or so miles to school.

I managed to get myself into the first group for our first Practical in the Cadaver lab. (I feel quite confident about this test, since I'd been fretting about remembering "popliteal" (the area behind your knee), but then was able to remember it for the question that happened to ask us to identify the popliteal area! Go me.)

Golf Pro texted me that he was ready, and I got the text right after finishing my test. So I drove back to Convenient Care to fetch him, and pick up the meds they ordered. He'd been given a pain shot and an anti-nausea shot (evidently, when you're in serious pain and they poke at the injured place, it can make you nauseated -- duh), so he wasn't too clear on stuff. I took him home, and he went up to bed.

Today, it involved me having a long chat with Golf Pro's doc (I am SO glad he signed that form that says they can talk to me). I got the low down on his four fractured ribs. I learned that he needed to come back today to have his pulse-ox taken since thy discovered a "pneumo" on his x-ray (translated, that means that there was air in the pleural cavity that was OUTSIDE his lungs, which is not where it's supposed to be, and a wee hole in his lungs from which it had come. They weren't terribly worried though, since it HAD been two days, and his lung showed no sign of collapsing). I took good notes, and made his follow up appointment for Monday.

We did go back, his O2 was fine. But the pain meds weren't doing diddly. The doc and I worked out a new plan, and she gave me a scrip for something more exciting just in case we really need it. (As it turns out, we've not needed it yet. Fingers crossed it stays that way).

Normally, I'd go to class in the afternoon, and then fetch a child or two, and come home.

Today, I went to class, and then went in to write a big check to the Band Boosters -- out of nowhere, Golf Pro decided that based on a long overdue payment that we'll be getting this fall, Bookworm gets to go to Disney with the Marching Band. And so do the rest of us. We'll be having Thanksgiving there -- with the band -- after watching them do their marchy goodness that afternoon.

Bookworm is pleased. Kitty doesn't really know yet. Heck, I only found out that it would be feasible 22 hours ago, and only learned that it was actually possible 9 hours ago (when the band director confirmed that she could sneak us in despite yesterday having been the cut-off).

Normally, I'd spend the evening at home, hanging with my kids, and watching TV or movies. Instead, I'm about to get in my car, and (voluntarily mind you), drive to a place where people will be playing (and watching) football. Then I'm going to park my car, and go PAY some one to let me into the area where I can SEE them play football. ???

What?

Who am I? What have I done with myself???

Oh yeah.

I"m a mom. And I have a daughter in marching band. And she's quit telling me that they "suck" and is now willing to have me come watch their half-time show.

Even though it's cool, and threatening to drizzle a bit, I know that this weather is WAY better than boiling hot, or freezing cold. And my experience wtih football is that you're far more likely to encounter one of those two than a brisk but otherwise pleasant evening. So..